Rhubarb

May is the start of the rhubarb season, and these last couple of weeks my house has been constantly overflowing with it. We bought our first rhubarb stalks at the farmer’s market in Brussels a couple of weeks ago. I knew I wanted to bake something rhubarb-y, but I wasn’t sure what yet. After having decided on cupcakes (two different kinds – because I couldn’t decide which recipe to try) we found ourselves with even more rhubarb after a friend of the family dropped some off at our place. No problem, I said to myself, I’ll try out an Italian rhubarb soda syrup with these new ones. Then my friend Greet got me even more rhubarb, and I made a rhubarb buckle that was wildly popular around the house. The last of the rhubarb (another 2 kg!) was used to make jam.

Crumble cupcakes

One-batter cupcakes

The cupcakes in the pink have a crumble topping and were deemed best of the two. Here’s the recipe. They’re layer cupcakes – cake, rhubarb, crumble. I’m not sure if it’s really necessary to bake the rhubarb separately before layering them in the cupcakes, it seems to me like it should be fine to just add them raw, and that’s what I would do next time around.

The cupcakes in the blue are this recipe – just minus the brown sugar mascarpone icing. Though I must say the fact that she adds a recipe for homemade mascarpone made my inner baking!geek freak out completely.

01. Wash and peel the rhubarb, cut in pieces (1.5 cm) and mix it with the sugar. Let this sit for about an hour – you’ll notice the rhubarb will start losing some yummy juices. Don’t pour those away!

02. Mix the dry ingredients for the crumble, and then add the melted butter. Work until you have a crumbly mixture, set in fridge so the butter can firm up again.

03. For the batter: mix eggs and sugar until light and foamy. Add butter (room temperature), lemon zest and salt and mix it in. In another bowl mix the flour, corn starch and baking powder, then sift the flour-mixture into the egg-mixture. Use a spatula to carefully combine.

04. Assemble: line your baking tray with baking paper. Poor in the batter and even it out, poor the rhubarb on top and make sure to add the leaked-out-juices as well. Bake this at 180°C for 30 minutes. Take it out, add the crumble, and bake for another 30 minutes!